There was already a great deal of consternation among the rightwing due to the election of socialist Zohran Mamdani as mayor of New York City and socialist Katie Miller as mayor of Seattle. The volume of warnings got higher after NYC Democrats gave primary victories to three socialist candidates this summer. But on closer inspection, it appears to be Much Ado about Nothing.
The political platform and electoral strategy of the Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) represent a fundamental departure from the traditional economic and political consensus of the United States. Because DSA candidates frequently run within the Democratic Party primary system—particularly in progressive urban centers—their success presents specific, political challenges to some, but in no way are they structurally challenging the established American framework of free-market capitalism and individual liberty.
From the perspective of some political pundits, the core principles and policy goals of the DSA pose distinct threats to foundational U.S. freedoms. Those threats are at best journalistic hype.
The DSA’s explicit goal to transition away from a capitalist economy is far more anti-business babble than the national electorate will accept. The United States has long had an electorate that demands free stuff. What stops socialism from ever occurring is Americans also refuse to give up what is already theirs. While not enough Americans are true libertarians, traditional American freedom is still deeply tied to the right to own, control, and profit from private property and enterprise.
Perhaps even harder to achieve is the desire for massive redistribution of wealth and the restructuring of society envisioned by democratic socialism. As mentioned, Americans love free stuff and paying higher taxes to achieve the DSA’s goals does not make stuff free. Implementing the DSA’s social programs require unprecedented levels of taxation on income, wealth, and corporate revenue. The trend toward socialism acquiring real political power will always be foiled when it means taxing the middle classes more.
The tactical decision of the DSA to run candidates as Democrats—rather than forming a third party—does present a specific institutional challenge to that party. I suspect it is a situation that will allow a number of Republicans to escape the consequences of their many recent mistakes.
In reality, things are not going as smoothly as socialists expected. The real-world governance of elected democratic socialist politicians—most notably Mamdani in New York City and Wilson in Seattle—demonstrate the immediate breakdown that occurs when radical ideological promises collide with the unyielding laws of economics and fiscal reality.
Despite campaigning on sweeping, anti-capitalist transformations and expansive social programs, their early tenures have been defined by severe operational failures, massive budgetary shortfalls, and political retreats. Analysts and critics should view their performance not merely as standard political missteps, but as a total failure of their foundational economic theories.
In New York City, Mayor Mamdani entered office on a platform that promised an unprecedented expansion of the municipal state, including fare-free transit, and city-owned grocery stores. The reality of his administration has been a stark lesson in fiscal mismanagement. Confronted with a staggering $5.4 billion budget deficit, Mamdani’s ambitious agenda collapsed almost immediately upon taking office. Instead of delivering the sweeping new entitlements promised to his base, his administration has been forced to dramatically scale back expectations, relying on state bailouts just to keep the city functional.
Traditional economic critique notes that Mamdani’s strategy of “taxing the rich” to fund his platform ignores the reality of geographic mobility. New York City already relies on high-income filers for a massive portion of its income tax revenue, with top combined marginal tax rates exceeding 50%. By signaling dramatic attempts to tax NYC’s wealthiest corporations and residents even more, Mamdani has a front row seat to watch the announced evaporation of new development in his city.
Mamdani’s election is not a unique event. The historical landscape of socialists holding congressional or local office in New York City is long and extensive, reaching back over a century.
All the way across the country, Seattle’s new socialist mayor, Katie Wilson, is also running headfirst into a classic governance conflict: the collision between an ambitious progressive platform and hard fiscal constraints. Wilson, a longtime activist, ran on an expansive platform that promised fare-free transit, universal childcare, and massive investments in publicly owned, mixed-income housing. However, her administration immediately slammed into a fiscal wall. Upon taking office, Wilson inherited a steep structural budget shortfall, which sits at roughly $175 million. Because the city legally cannot run a deficit, she has been forced to shift from a focus on expanding services to managing a fiscal crisis. This has led to two main areas of political and economic friction. To keep the city solvent, Wilson has had to propose municipal spending cuts. For a mayor elected on a platform of expanding the public safety net and city services, cutting existing departmental budgets has created immediate friction with her progressive base and public sector unions.
To offset cuts and fund her housing and transit initiatives, Wilson has proposed a highly controversial, city-wide capital gains tax (which would sit on top of Washington State’s existing capital gains tax).
This strategy has intensified resistance from Seattle’s business community and moderate factions, who argue that additional local capital gains taxes will drive out investment and high earners. Meanwhile, her signature campaign promise of fare-free transit has been sidelined while the administration scrambles to pass a balanced budget.
Ultimately, Wilson is finding that implementing a socialist model of public infrastructure requires a level of liquid capital that the city simply doesn’t have, forcing a pivot toward compromise and fiscal triage.
Wilson’s election is also not a unique political situation. Seattle’s history of radical and socialist politics is deeply woven into its municipal DNA, and like New York City, it tends to arrive in distinct historical waves separated by long periods of conventional, business-aligned governance.
While both socialists are vocal about their intents, both face significant restrictions when it comes to their tax strategies.
Under New York State law and the state constitution, New York City does not possess independent tax authority. While the city can manage property tax assessments within state-mandated limits, any creation of a new tax or alteration of existing tax rates requires explicit enabling legislation passed by the New York state legislature in Albany and signed by the governor.
Seattle also does not have the unilateral authority to raise taxes at will. Under Washington State’s constitutional and statutory framework, taxing authority is strictly tethered to state law and constitutional limitations. Ultimately, Seattle operates within a tight fiscal straitjacket designed by the state.
These constraints highlight a major flaw in municipal socialist strategy: the local executive office simply lacks the sovereign mechanisms required to fundamentally upend a market economy.
From an institutional and practical economic standpoint, the argument that these elections will drag the rest of the country left fails based on several hard realities. New York City and Seattle are deep-blue metropolitan areas with political centers of gravity that are miles apart from the average American electorate. A democratic socialist winning a low-turnout primary or a tight general election in a city that already votes overwhelmingly Democratic does not indicate that voters in South Carolina, Florida, or Louisiana are eager to embrace anti-capitalist policies.
Unlike a sovereign nation, a city operates within an open, highly competitive domestic market. The threat of capital flight acts as an automatic, market-driven brake on radical local governance. As noted with New York’s and Seattle’s tax laws, cities lack the core macroeconomic levers required to execute a true socialist transition. They cannot print currency, they cannot control international trade, and they cannot independently overhaul national corporate laws.
Those fearing having DSA members or supporters in Congress should consider their lack of progress to date.
The socialist “Squad,” Reps. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY), Ayanna Pressley (D-MA), Ilhan Omar (D-MN), and Rashida Tlaib (D-MI) have all been in Congress since 2019, and certainly impact your internet reading. However, to date, only Tlaib has been the primary sponsor of a bill that was signed into law. It was a bill naming a post office in Detroit after Rosa Parks.
Then there is the predominant elected socialist, Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont. Across his entire congressional career—spanning thirty-five years—Sanders has been the primary sponsor of only three bills that became law. Two were bills renaming post offices and the third was the the Veterans’ Compensation Cost-of-Living Adjustment Act of 2013 which was cosponsored by six Democrats and six Republicans.
In the U.S. Congress, democratic socialists face deep systemic and ideological barriers to passing legislation. Because both major parties operate firmly within a capitalist framework, radical economic reforms find very few allies. Furthermore, structural hurdles like the outsized influence of corporate campaign financing heavily favor centrist or conservative policies. Ultimately, the progressive movement lacks the overwhelming voting majority needed to overcome these institutional roadblocks.
Perhaps it is time to quote Mad magazine’s Alfred E. Neuman—“What, me worry?”
